


Nature Takes Its Course (1/1)

by whichclothes



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-12
Updated: 2011-09-12
Packaged: 2017-10-23 16:54:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/252630
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whichclothes/pseuds/whichclothes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Xander wants a change of scenery.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nature Takes Its Course (1/1)

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to the lovely and wonderful chaoskir, who gave me the prompt for this story, and to my ever-trusty beta, silk_labyrinth.

_**Nature Takes Its Course (1/1)**_  
 **Title** : Nature Takes Its Course (1/1)  
 **Pairing:** Spike/Xander  
 **Rating:** PG  
 **Disclaimer** : I'm not Joss  
 **Summary:** Xander wants a change of scenery.  
 **Author's Notes:** Thank you to the lovely and wonderful chaoskir, who gave me the prompt for this story, and to my ever-trusty beta, silk_labyrinth.

  
 **  
NATURE TAKES ITS COURSE   
**

  
Xander sighed. “This isn’t working, Spike.”

  
Spike rolled over and looked at him. “Not working? The shagging last night—”

  
“Oh, the shagging last night definitely worked. Twice, as I recall, which was pretty good considering an evening on patrol and mortal limitations. That thing you did with your tongue, and when you practically defied gravity— Yes, definitely working. That wasn’t what I meant.”

  
Spike sat up, alarm clear on his expressive face. “You mean … us? I know I’m not, erm, what you expected to end up with, but—”

  
“It’s not us, Fang.” Xander ran a quick thumb down Spike’s jawline. “We’ve been through this already—I am more than happy with my gay demon orientation, as long as I’m oriented at you.”

  
Spike’s concern changed to puzzlement. “Then what’s not working, love?”

  
“This.” Xander waved at the heavily curtained window. The thick draperies did nothing to muffle the sounds of honking and car engines, of shouting voices and those damn annoying beeps that trucks made when they backed up. An ambulance siren was wailing close by as well. “We patrol all night and then when I try to sleep during the day, there’s all this noise outside and people calling and salespeople ringing the doorbell. I’m not getting enough sleep.”

  
“ ’T’s what comes of keeping vamp hours, pet.”

  
Xander sat up and flung an arm around Spike’s bare shoulders. “I know. And it’s not the night-owlishness that gets to me. It’s the daytime din.” He’d tried earplugs, but being down to one eye and no ears was unsettling to a guy who’d spent his life around monsters—even if one of those monsters was right beside him, more than ready to battle whatever came at him.

  
“Dunno what we can do about that,” Spike said.

  
“I do!” Xander announced. He yanked open the drawer in his bedside table and pulled out a magazine, which he plopped into Spike’s lap.

  
Spike looked at it with his head cocked. “ _Country Living_? Just because you’re sleeping with a bloke you reckon you need to go antiquing and reupholster the sofa in chintz?”

  
“We can skip the floral slipcover part. But … maybe we can relocate.”

  
“You don’t fancy Philadelphia? We could try Boston instead. Plenty of monsters there. Or we could go back to the West Coast. Seattle—now there’s a place a vampire could unlive in comfort, and they have all those ridiculous coffee things you mainline.”

  
Xander shook his head. “Not Boston and not Seattle. Same noise problems there. I was thinking of something more … rural.”

  
A scarred eyebrow lifted. “Rural?” 

  
Xander scooted close, squishing them together, then licked at the tender spot just below Spike’s ear. He’d been living with a demon for three years—he knew how to play dirty. “Picture it, baby. Just you and me, sitting naked on a fur rug in front of a roaring fire—”

  
“Flammable here.”

  
“—in front of a DVD of a roaring fire. No sounds outside but birds calling. During the day, I work in our garden, cultivating vegetables—”

  
“Which neither of us will eat.”

  
“—and getting all nice and sweaty. Losing those little love handles.”

  
Spike poked him in the belly. “I like your love handles. Softer when I sleep against you.”

  
“And at night you run through the forest, wrestling bears and stuff. Being all call of the wild. I could fix up our cabin really great. Put in a hot tub, maybe. We could live off the grid, keep chickens, can our own fruit—”

  
“Fruity enough as it is, love.”

  
“Work with me here!” Xander huffed and turned away slightly, crossing his arms over his chest.

  
He heard the thump as Spike’s head connected with the headboard. But then a moment later Spike was rubbing Xander’s back. “ ’M not really the outdoorsy type, love. Didn’t reckon you were either.”

  
“I was a Boy Scout. For, like, three weeks, until Dad said I was too big a pansy to be a Scout and Mom got tired of driving me. I earned a merit badge though. Okay, it was in basketry, but that could come in useful in the great outdoors, right?” When Spike just looked at him skeptically, Xander sighed. “Look, Angel gave you plenty of money and we’ve been working hard. Can’t we retire? Or at least take an extended vacation from the slayage? Go back to nature. Somewhere peaceful and safe and pretty, where it smells like air freshener and nothing’s trying to kill us and we can’t even get cell phone service. Please?” He knew he sounded pathetic but he really was wiped.

  
Spike nuzzled at his neck. “Tell you what, pet. You find us a place to let for a couple weeks. Just to try it out, yeah? And if you’re still clamoring for pastoral living then I’ll be right there with you, helping you buy a pickup truck.”

  
“Really?”

  
Another nuzzle, this one more insistent than the first. “Absolutely. Now … how about if I do some plowing and plant a few seeds right now … in you?”

  
“That’s awful,” Xander said with a snort.

  
“Evil, yeah?” laughed Spike and pulled Xander down onto the mattress.

  
***

  
Spike was cranky. First there had been the cross-country drive, during which he’d had to drink his blood cold and hide under a tarp in the back seat during daylight hours. He’d complained about the motels too, with the clerks who made faces when Xander asked for a room with only one bed, and the baths with crappy water pressure. And he’d whined about stopping at fast food joints and truck stops, even though he knew Xander had to eat and those were the only places open at three in the morning. “I want a bath and a kip and some hot blood,” he grumbled, slamming the car door and stomping up the gravel driveway.

  
Xander, however, was feeling slightly giddy with excitement. Yeah, he hadn’t been thrilled with the journey either—three straight days of being forced to listen to the Sex Pistols and the Ramones would do that to a guy—but now they were here and the cabin they’d rented was perfect. It was an A-frame chalet with a deck out front—the big windows facing north for vampire safety—set among thick stands of woods and several steep miles from anything resembling civilization. One whole outside wall of the place was stacked with firewood, and when Xander bounced out of the driver’s seat he could hear a stream babbling behind the cabin. You could fish right on the property, he’d been told. 

  
Xander loped up the driveway and beat Spike to the front door. Spike’s sour face went even sourer when Xander had to invite him inside. “I paid for the bleeding place,” Spike muttered. Xander kissed his cheek and skipped inside.

  
The interior looked just as it had on the Internet: rustic wood furniture, wide floorboards, knotty pine walls. “The entire thing’s a bloody vampire death trap,” Spike announced.

  
“Only if I get really pissed off at you, Mr. Grumpypants. C’mon. It looks pretty splinter-free to me.”

  
Spike stood near the entryway, glowering, while Xander ran back to the car to fetch the duffel bags that held most of their worldly possessions. Xander’s tools could remain in the trunk and Spike could drag his own cooler inside when he got hungry.

  
“A loft!” Xander exclaimed when he got back inside. “I always wanted a house with a loft. The bed’s up there. King size! And a tub with Jacuzzi jets.”

  
“Lovely.” Spike grabbed his bag out of Xander’s hand and tromped up the stairs. While closet doors slammed and the shower began to run, Xander zoomed around the ground floor, checking out the kitchen with the granite countertops and the little mudroom area with the ski racks and the slightly mildewy-smelling half-bath. The living room was large, the couches were comfy, and the fireplace looked inviting even though it was August and his vampire had flammability issues. He was disappointed to discover that the TV was a small one, not a flat screen, and instead of a DVD or Blu-ray player it had an antique VHS machine. A little cabinet next to the TV was full of tapes, most of which seemed to be the collected works of John Hughes. Xander pictured Spike being forced to sit through _Sixteen Candles_ and had a slight giggle fit.

  
When the chuckles subsided, Xander’s stomach rumbled. He instinctively reached for his phone before remembering that he wouldn’t get any service out here, and even if he did, he was probably a little out of delivery range for Fat Mike’s Pizza or Pearl of the Orient, his favorite places back in Philly. The little general store they’d passed several miles back was long since closed and they hadn’t brought any groceries with them. The kitchen cabinets proved to contain nothing but a few spices, three bags of Lipton tea, and a shriveled head of garlic, which Xander quickly got rid of. Okay, shopping was definitely on the morning agenda. For now, Xander had to settle for his leftover road trip snacks: half a Slim Jim, three Red Vines, and a Werthers.

  
Spike was waiting for him when he crawled into the bed, which really was enormous. The vampire was shower-warmed and smelled like Ivory soap. His hair was in ungelled curls that Xander couldn’t help but run his fingers through.

  
“Sorry I was growly,” Spike said, his mouth inches from Xander’s neck.

  
“ ’T’s okay. It was a long drive. But now we’re here and it’ll be great. Tomorrow we can do some exploring. The web page said there’s a lake nearby. Maybe we could go for a swim. Skinny-dipping in the moonlight with my favorite demon—that sounds pretty good to me.”

  
“All right, love.” Spike’s voice had that rough, purring quality it got when he was sleepy, and so although Xander was too exhausted for real sex, he couldn’t help but plant several kisses on sharp cheekbones, and run his fingers over ribs and muscles, and squeeze a little at theworld’s most spectacular ass. Spike reciprocated with kisses and caresses of his own. They fell asleep like that, still lazily groping and stroking.

  
***

  
The morning was wonderful. Xander slept until almost noon, Spike snuggled up tightly against him. There was no banging of garbage cans, no screaming children, no screeching brakes. Just a bluejay calling and, if Xander concentrated, the wind rustling through the tree branches and the stream tumbling over stones. Perfect.

  
But when he finally got out of bed there was no coffee. Yes, intellectually Xander had understood that there were no Starbucks in the woods. But the vicious, caffeine-craving monkey on his back didn’t care—it wanted a venti Americano and it wanted it now, goddammit. 

  
“I’m gonna head down to the store,” Xander announced as he pulled on some clothing. “You want anything?”

  
Spike blinked sleepily at him, then yawned. “Nah.”

  
“ ’Kay. Be back soon.”

  
The entire store was about half the size of the produce section in the supermarket where Xander shopped in Philly. The clerk was a guy in his sixties with messy gray hair, grizzled stubble, and a striped shirt. He was reading a magazine and barely looked up when Xander came in. There was a small selection of basic groceries, some cleaning supplies, fishing lures, postcards and maps, t-shirts, rain ponchos, Styrofoam coolers, camp stoves, and lots and lots of bug spray. Xander filled a plastic basket with various foodstuffs; the only coffee the place carried was instant, so Xander shuddered but picked up a jar of that too.

  
“You got any bagels?” Xander asked when he placed his basket on the counter.

  
The man finally looked at him, grunted at the eye patch, and then pointed across the store. “Bread’s over there.”

  
“Yeah, but what about bagels?”

  
When the guy only stared, Xander sighed. “How about steak?”

  
“Meat’s in the fridge.”

  
“Yeah. Hamburger patties, hot dogs, and lunch meat. Anything more substantial?”

  
“If you don’t see it, I ain’t got it.”

  
Xander paid for his purchases resignedly and walked outside. Other than the general store, the rest of the “town” consisted of a gas station with two rusty pumps and a small café. Xander had originally planned to grab some brunch in the café—he could go for some hearty diner food for sure—but a sign on the door proclaimed that it was closed for the season. Apparently, people in the boonies only got hungry when there was skiing.

  
Back at the cabin, Spike was sitting in the living room, shirtless and bed-headed, glasses perched on his nose and Kindle in his hands. He looked delicious. “Done with the hunter-gatherer bit?” he asked.

  
Xander plopped the grocery bags onto the kitchen counter.“Yeah, only not so much with the gathering. The pickings are mighty slim. Unless you are looking for trail mix—they have a good supply of that.”

  
“I’ll pass. Don’t fancy it when the raisins get stuck in my fangs.”

  
It took Xander only a few minutes to put the food away. He collapsed next to Spike on the couch and for ten minutes or so he enjoyed the quiet. Then he got bored and reached for the remote. Unfortunately, a frantic run through the channels revealed that the little TV received only a few stations and that nothing of interest was on them. Xander clicked the set off again, sighed, and snuggled up against his vampire. 

  
Spike ignored Xander's initial moves: flinging an arm around Spike's shoulders and snuffling at his hair. When Xander licked at his neck in the exact spot that always drove the vampire wild, Spike simply pressed the little button on his e-reader to turn the page.

  
“Hey,” Xander said.

  
Spike glanced at him, smiled distractedly, and turned back to his reading.

  
“Hey!” repeated Xander more insistently.

  
“Shh. I’m at a good bit.”

  
“I thought _I_ was the good bit,” Xander pouted.

  
Spike sighed. “Look, pet. Why don’t you go have a tromp about the woods? Scout the land, yeah?”

  
“But I want to explore with you.”

  
“You’ll have to wait for dark then.”

  
There wasn’t any way Xander could argue with that. Instead, he wandered into the kitchen and made himself an unsatisfying bologna sandwich on spongy bread, with plain potato chips because that’s all the general store had, and a can of Coors—it had been that or Budweiser. The store hadn’t had Twinkies either, just some knock-off that tasted like packing material. At least his stomach was full. He wandered around the kitchen for a while, opening and closing cupboards. He went outside and found an axe inside a little shed and split some kindling, which was both more work and considerably more splintery than he’d expected. He discovered—and just barely managed not to shriek at—an enormous spider that ogled him speculatively with all eight eyes and might possibly have been a species of demon. He sniffed at some yellow flowers, had an extensive sneezing fit, and got chased by a bee.

  
He went back inside and took a nap.

  
Spike shook him awake shortly before sunset. While Spike sipped contentedly on a mugful of blood, Xander made himself a grilled cheese sandwich. And then they pulled on shoes and jackets and headed outside.

  
There were complications. For one thing, while Spike could see fine in the inky blackness of the dense forest, Xander might just as well have closed his remaining eye. He hadn’t thought to buy a flashlight so he ended up having to hang onto Spike’s arm like a debutante at the ball, and then when the path grew too narrow for that, he held onto Spike’s shoulder. For another thing, there were mosquitos. “You’re the only bloodsucker I want,” he complained to Spike. 

  
“Little monsters don’t fancy me at all.”

  
“Professional courtesy. Next time I’m gonna bathe in DEET first.”

  
“Not if you want to share my bed, you won’t. That shite will fuck up my nose for days.”

  
Xander grumbled silently and almost tripped over a root.

  
But soon they came to a clearing and there was the lake he’d been promised. It was more of a pond, really, complete with croaking frogs, but it sparkled prettily in the moonlight. It was private too; there was nobody else around for miles. So Xander peeled off his clothing, ran down the sharp-pebbled beach, and jumped on in.

  
And then scrambled right back out again. “Jesus _Christ_!”

  
Spike was still fully dressed and looking at him skeptically. “Problem, love?”

  
“C-cold. It’s really, really goddamn cold.” Xander was positive his skin was as blue as Spike’s eyes, and his balls were attempting to tunnel themselves into his body in self-defense.

  
“Snow run-off, I reckon,” Spike replied.

  
“But it’s summer.”

  
Even in the dark, Xander could see the look that Spike gave him. “We’re in the mountains, berk.”

  
Xander growled in reply, then spent several miserable minutes trying to drag dry clothes onto his wet body while shaking like he had the DTs. Spike didn’t help; he simply lit a cigarette and stared up at the sky. “Can’t recall the last time I saw so many stars. Dru gave them all names. She used to have conversations with them, even when she couldn’t see them through smog and whatnot. She told me the stars led her to me.”

  
“That’s a lot more romantic than a fifth of Jack,” Xander grumbled as he zipped up his pants.

  
“It was Wild Turkey, there were two fifths, and I’d fallen for you months before that. The booze just … eased the way a bit.”

  
Xander thought there was a fine line between eased and easy, and he’d been on the wrong side that night. He'd gone from deep denial to naked ass in the air, all in the time it took to empty a couple of bottles. Not that he’d regretted it since then—he and Spike had been an item for almost three years now, and they’d been the happiest three years of his life. Demon patrols, sleep deprivation and all.

  
They walked silently back to the cabin, Xander again using Spike as his seeing-eye vamp. But when they got to the door, Spike turned around and kissed his cheek. “I fancy a bit of a hunt.”

  
“Are you gonna go drain Bambi? Hey, can there be vampire animals, too? Aside from bats, I mean.”

  
“I’ll try not to sire any squirrels, love.” With another kiss, Spike melted back into the darkness.

  
Xander wandered inside, where the television programming hadn’t improved at all. Apparently people who lived in the boonies only liked to watch crap. An extensive rooting through closets and cupboards resulted in two paperback spy novels and a worn copy of _Skiing for Dummies_ , three board games and a deck of cards, and another of those huge spiders. This time he actually did shriek—and he shut the door really fast. He started a game of solitaire, only to discover that he was missing a ten of spades and a three of hearts. So, with a resigned sigh, he climbed into bed.

  
***

  
“You didn’t wake me up!”

  
“Sorry, Xan. I was knackered by the time I got back. Had a brilliant run, though. I found a bear! Didn’t eat it though—don’t fancy the taste.”

  
“I’m glad someone was having fun.”

  
Spike poked him in the side. “Thought you enjoyed your peace and quiet.”

  
“Well … yeah. But only when I’m trying to sleep.”

  
Spike just shrugged. Xander yawned and climbed out of bed. After a quick visit to the bathroom he headed downstairs for some cardboard toast and gag-worthy instant coffee. As he ate he stared out the windows. The sky had clouded over. It looked like it might even rain. But it was really nice and quiet. 

  
He decided to go for a walk before the weather turned worse, and he tiptoed upstairs to get dressed. Spike was fast asleep and possibly more adorable than when he was awake. It took a good deal of effort for Xander to resist simply diving back under the covers with him.

  
It turned out to be a steeper hike down to the creek than he’d anticipated. The water itself was pretty enough, although he now knew better than to touch it with any part of his body. He briefly considered looking for the fishing gear that the website had promised, except he’d never actually gone fishing and wasn’t sure what it involved—aside from a lot of waiting. He wasn’t all that good at waiting. And what if he actually caught something? He wouldn’t know what to do with it, and ever since the swim team episode in high school he’d found seafood unappetizing. Maybe Spike would drink the fish blood, but, well, ick. Then his lover would have fish blood breath.

  
Xander tossed a few rocks into the swiftly moving water and turned to hike back to the house. But between his lack of depth perception and his huge left-hand blind spot, the steep and uneven terrain was a bitch to deal with. He fell twice, and then again a third time, twisting his ankle badly enough that he could barely make it back to the cabin.

  
***

  
“Ow!”

  
“It’d hurt less if you stayed still.”

  
“It’d hurt less if you just chopped the damn thing off.”

  
“Don’t tempt me,” Spike said as he clipped the Ace bandage in place. Then he stood and kissed Xander’s temple. “Keep it elevated. Is there ice in the freezer?”

  
“There’s those cooler bags from your blood supply.”

  
“Perfect.” Spike went to the kitchen and returned a moment later with the ice packs. He carefully placed one under Xander’s ankle and one above, examined his work, sat down next to Xander on the couch, and picked up his Kindle.

  
“Hey! Invalid here.”

  
“Doctored invalid.”

  
“Doctored but not entertained.”

  
Spike put his e-reader down. “What would you have me do? I could read to you.”

  
Xander moaned pitifully.

  
“Could do a strip-tease,” Spike offered.

  
“Emphasis on the tease, ’cause with my gimpy leg I can’t really be very participatory.”

  
“What do you want then?” Spike was beginning to sound exasperated.

  
“We could … play a game?”

  
Spike lifted an eyebrow. “Game?”

  
“I found some last night.” Xander pointed at a side table. “See?”

  
Spike sauntered over to take a look. “Hungry Hungry Hippo? Might as well stake me. And Life’s unsuited to a vamp, innit? I reckon we could try Scrabble, though.”

  
But Scrabble was a bust. Spike used a bunch of really big words and claimed they were real, and Xander didn’t have a dictionary to check them. Plus Spike spelled things weird British ways, with extra e’s and o’s and things, and Xander rarely managed anything longer than four letters. After a spirited argument about whether species of demons were acceptable, and if so, whether there really existed a type of demon called Xyqznkif, they gave it up and put the board away.

  
Spike went back to reading his book, and Xander tried to amuse himself by staring at Spike.

  
It was very quiet and peaceful.

  
Spike made him some dinner later on, but the available ingredients were limited and Spike was a crappy cook—nobody would ever hire a vampire chef—so the results were uninspiring. “I want pad thai. Or maybe some lamb rogan josh with a big pile of naan. Or a big, juicy T-bone with—”

  
“Could roast you a haunch of arachnid.”

  
Xander took one look at the enormous spider skittering in his direction, screamed, and fell off the chair.

  
***

  
“Who'd guess that the big city is safer than the sticks?” Xander mused as he listened to a garbage truck lumbering by under their window. Down on the sidewalk, two women were arguing loudly in Spanglish, and a crew had just begun jackhammering in front of the building across the street.

  
“ ’S all right, pet. Doc said the poison oak rash would be cleared in another day or two.”

  
“Maybe. But my foot’s still in a cast and I don’t even wanna know what kind of bug gave me that bite on my ass, or when.”

  
“It is a shame to have such a work of art marred,” Spike said, throwing his arm around Xander’s shoulders. “But I’m sorry your dreams of country living were shattered.”

  
“Which you knew perfectly well would happen.”

  
Spike shrugged. “Yeah. But I really had nothing to do with it.” He smirked evilly. “I simply let nature take its course.” 

  
_  
~~~fin~~~   
_

  



End file.
